


My Best Friend (Excerpt)

by lorax



Category: Star Trek (2009)
Genre: Community: st_respect, Ficlet, M/M, Marriage Proposal, Schmoop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-15
Updated: 2011-09-15
Packaged: 2017-11-14 07:13:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/512695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lorax/pseuds/lorax
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jim proposes, Bones is suspicious.</p>
            </blockquote>





	My Best Friend (Excerpt)

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a section of a collaborative fic for the [Ship Olympics](http://st-respect.livejournal.com/), for [Team Jim and Bones](http://teamjimandbones.livejournal.com/). This is only the section written by me, and the complete entry can be seen [here](http://st-respect.livejournal.com/87625.html). Unbeta-ed and posted here for the sake of archiving!

  
Bones hasn’t ever been been here before, and he somehow doubts he'll make another trip unless someone drags him by the hair.  For one thing, the atmosphere around the planet isn't transporter friendly, which meant taking a shuttle down.  Call him crazy, but any planet you couldn't get a quick pass off if things went down badly wasn't a planet he wanted to visit.  Or at least, it wasn't one he wanted to visit while he was with Jim, Sulu, or any of the other half-crazy yahoos who'd taken the chance to get off ship and eat at one of the supposedly famous local restaurants.  
  
Bones had protested them going planetside at all, since it was a diplomatically useless planet, and so far out of the 12 planets they'd taken R&R on, six had ended up trying to kill them, four had wanted to kidnap them to arrange for elaborate Federation trade negotiations, one had carnivorous plant life that Sulu smuggled aboard and then accidentally almost let eat a yeoman, and one had declared Jim a god.   
  
It was mostly that last one that made Bones never want to venture off ship unnecessarily ever again.  The last thing Jim Kirk's ego needed was _worshippers_.  He'd spent weeks trying to convince everyone to call him "His Most Holy and Rapturous Captain", and wriggled his eyebrows at Bones and mentioned how he was "in need of a little worshipping at his temple" every night until Bones had started threatening to bring tranquilizers to bed to shut him up.  
  
But Jim had persisted, and Nyota had stopped him mid-complaining to tell him that "really, he needed to do as he was told, this once, Leonard" with a significant stare.  That likely still would have convinced him, but he'd heard Spock recording his video log and planning to make use of the down time to run some surprise drills.   
  
So planetside it was.  
  
So far, he is completely unimpressed.  The "authentic southwest earth" restaurant seems to consider oversized hats and a plethora of fake (and inexplicably blue) cactus decorations to be southwestern.  They do at least have steak from actual cows.  Jim sits opposite him, fidgeting with his silverware in a way that looks random but that Bones had come to understand meant he was probably mentally calculating how he could use it to build an elaborate bridge across the table because he was bored.  Sometimes, Bones thinks he should take everything away but a spoon and cut his meat for him just to thwart him.  "Where the hell is everyone, anyway?" he asks, cutting into a roll and checking to see that it was actually bread and not some strange alien hybrid bread-creature.  You never could be too careful.  
  
"Not coming," Jim answers absently, balancing a knife carefully against a fork to make them both stand upright.  Bones can’t resist knocking the table with his foot, making them drop with a clang against the plate he'd used as a base.  Jim looks up and frowns, more uneasy than annoyed, meeting Bones’ raised eyebrow of silent questioning.  "I figured it could be just us."  
  
"You said 'we're all going out to dinner', Jim," Bones reminds him.  
  
"I didn't technically define who 'all' included."  Jim pauses a shade too long and then explains.  "All of us in this room."  
  
Bones looks around suspiciously.  "Is this a date?"  
  
"Yes.  It's a date.  Shut up, stop poking the bread, and eat, Bones," Jim tells him, flashing a too-charming smile.  Bones never trusted that smile.  It means Jim is Up to Something, and it makes him want to search Jim for contraband almost as much as it makes him want to kiss him.  Either one usually leads to trouble.  
  
"If I end up with food poisoning, it's your fault," Bones informs him.  He ignores the warm flush he feels, though Jim's smug grin says it’s probably showing up as a red-cheeked flush.  Damnit.   
  
The food, when it comes, is shockingly decent.  The potatoes are grainy, and the wine has bubbles where there shouldn't be any bubbles, but Bones isn't much of a wine connoisseur anyway, and the steak is tender and just the right amount of pink, so he’s in a forgiving mood about the rest of it.  Jim is strangely quiet, conversation stopping and starting in spurts that have Bones wondering what the hell is wrong with Kirk, who could usually talk through anything, up to and including natural disasters and bad birthday parties, as he'd proved several times.  
  
He’s full after using the last piece of bread to lop up the tail end of the steak-juice on his plate, having resolved that Jim's strangeness aside, he is going to enjoy every damn bit of the precious dead cow in front of him.  Beneath the table, his legs are comfortably stretched out and Jim's ankles are hooked over his in a way that’s at once comforting and unnerving.  Those are conflicting emotions he’s used to around Jim, though.  Jim's suggestion that they get dessert is strangely stringent, and Bones gives in, even though he’s pretty sure his stomach is going to explode if he actually eats any.  
  
Beside them, a couple are laughing over a shared chocolate thing.  Bones hesitates to call it a cake; it looks more like what happened to a cake when someone left it out in the rain.  They'd been cooing and laughing throughout the meal, and beside the empty plates pushed off to one side of the table were a pair of cards that read "happy anniversary!" in bright letters, a series of photographs flashing over the front of the cards.  Tacky as hell, Bones thinks, but then he'd once given his ex almost the exact same card, so maybe he isn't one to judge.  
  
From the corner of his eye, he sees one of the cards flash to an image of the couple dancing, both wearing grass skirts, and Bones changes his mind and decides he’s actually qualified to judge, and it _is_  tacky.  
  
"We could have that," Jim suddenly says, and Bones takes a moment to connect what he’s saying to the couple next to them.  He stares blankly, and Jim goes on, balancing silverware again.  "Anniversaries."  
  
"Anniversaries celebrate _annual_  things, so technically we already do.  Just because we've known each other more than a year.  For instance, we have an anniversaries of the first time you made me give you an IV to beat a hangover," Bones answers.  
  
"I had an exam," Jim replies, waving his hand dismissively.  "And that's not what I meant."  
  
"What _did_  you mean?"  
  
Kirk makes a frustrated sound, and then perks up as the waiter sets down some sort of apple and ice cream concoction in front of them.  "Try it."  
  
"I'm full," Bones tells him.  Plus, the apples have a strange metallic sheen he doesn’t altogether trust.  He reaches for his scanner and Jim kicks him under the table.  He bites back a yelp - damn him, always managing to hit the shin.  "What the hell was that for?"  
  
"You were about to scan it for poison, weren't you?" Kirk asks.  Bones doesn't bother to deny it.  It isn't his fault that he’s sensible and Jim’s an idiot who just eats apples even when they _gleam_.  "Just eat it, all right?"  
  
Jim's jaw is set stubbornly, and Bones peers at him, and then at the dessert, deciding to give in.  He slides a spoon into the ice cream on the side, since they _did_  have cows, and that looks safe at least.   
  
Jim kicks him again, and Bones grimaces, kicking back and throwing a napkin at him.  "Would you stop it!"  
  
"Just eat the damn dessert.  Don't analyze it.  Don't complain about it.  Just take a bite.  From the middle," Jim orders.  He has his Captain voice on, but Bones has long since stopped listening to that when Jim is off duty.  He gives in grudgingly, spoon dipping into the middle of the soppy, metallic mess hard enough that it _almost_  manages to send a vanilla splash onto Jim's hand, but not quite.  Unfortunately.  
  
The spoon thunks into something hard and metallic.  Jim's smile takes on a strange quality that Bones silently decides is _nervous_.  It’s damn unnerving to see on Jim.  His stomach tightens with expectation and he scoops into the dessert, pulling out a sticky round shape.   
  
Bones stares at the wedding band in mute shock.  He looks up to find Jim staring at him.  "This is a ring."  
  
"Yes."  
  
"You're giving me a ring?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"What is _wrong_  with you?" Bones demands.  
  
Jim's face falls slightly, but he rolls his eyes.  "Many, many things, according to you."  Bones stares, and he sighs, reaching across to snag the ring and then dropping it in his water glass, rinsing it off and then pulling it out again, wet fingers reaching for Bones' hand.  "We share quarters, we're practically damn married anyway, and were even before you realized you couldn't resist me-"  he smirks and Bones resists the urge to tell him, again, that he looks like a smug squirrel when he does that- "and I just thought..." Jim shrugs.  "We'll get bigger quarters as a married couple?"  
  
"You're asking me to marry you.  For _bigger quarters_.  When you're the Captain?" Bones asks.  
  
"There might be other reasons, too."  Jim’s staring at him, rolling the ring between his fingers, chin down enough that he’s watching Leonard through his lashes.  "So will you?"  
  
"I've done this once before you know.  It didn't turn out so well," Bones answers slowly.  
  
"That was the warm up," Jim answers, tone confident but expression unsure, eyes still searching Bones' face.  
  
Bones' mind is racing, running through all the ways this is a bad idea, but the part of him that had ignored his own good sense in the first place and slept with Jim to begin with has that strange, rushing feeling of exhilaration and certainty that he'd only ever felt with Jim, who was maddening but always unique.  He reaches out for the ring Jim is still spinning, sliding it onto his own finger.  It sticks over his knuckle for a second, and then slides down into place, and Jim's smile widens.  "You know, you're meant to be on one knee," he tells Jim.  
  
"Captains don't kneel."  Jim pauses and then flashes a wide, wicked grin.  "In public.  Unless you ask very, very nicely."  Bones flushes and hisses at him to shut up, since their little drama had attracted more than a few watching eyes and listening ears.  Jim ignores him, wriggling his eyebrows wickedly.  "You know, His Most Holy and Rapturous Captain could use some temple worsh-"  
  
He’s cut off by Bones leaning across the table to kick him, Jim's breath huffing out in a pained laugh as Bones kisses him and kicks him in the shin at the same time.  Around the restaurant, their fellow diners break out into good-natured applause and Bones does his best to ignore them.   
  
~*~


End file.
